The segmental representation of words as revealed by priming in a lexical decision and naming task.

Abstract

In previous studies, a priming task was used to explore the nature of the segmental representation of words. The phonetic overlap between primes and targets was varied. When phonemes occurred in the same syllable position in prime and target, responses to the target were faster than when prime and target shared no common phonemes. In contrast, when prime and target shared phonemes but the phoneme positions were different, no facilitation of target responses was found. New studies have further examined the segmental representation of speech using a new set of stimuli with both naming and lexical decision tasks. While previous prime–target pairs have been either both nonwords or words, the new studies include word–nonword and nonword–word trials. Additionally, the vowels in CVC prime and target were varied to examine the influence of the vowel similarity on priming when prime and target have consonants in common (e.g., prime ‘‘cat,’’ target ‘‘kit’’). Results will be discussed in terms of their implications for the nature of the abstract, segmental representation that underlies word recognition and lexical access. [Work supported by NIDCD Grant No. R01 DC00219 to SUNY at Buffalo.]